High school seniors apply to multiple colleges for two reasons: 1) they do not know yet exactly where they want to study; and 2) they do not know where they will be accepted. Do your research, then hedge your bets and apply to a range of schools you would be comfortable attending including a few safety schools, a few schools you’re reasonable certain will accept you, and a few schools like feel like a reach. That’s the common advice and it is the advice that Rachael Williams took to heart. Read the rest of this entry »

By Ann Vogel, CWA Parent

Until recently, Khoe Tyner ’11 expected to be cheering in the stands for the Huskies’ football team along with her parents, both alumni of the University of Washington. Although she was accepted at UW and nine other schools, she’s instead heading from her home in Poulsbo to St. Lawrence University in Canton, New York, where ice hockey rules. Read the rest of this entry »

By Katie Ryan, Director of College Counseling

In a year that set records for selectivity in college admissions, the Class of 2011 experienced remarkable success with their college applications. The class had an overall admit rate of 58 percent, most seniors were admitted to several schools, and 32 students reported at least one merit scholarship offer. Read the rest of this entry »

Emily Harper is counting on her feet to carry her far. The distance runner has dreams of seeing the world and she made her college choice with those adventures at the forefront of her mind. At Colby College in Maine, she expects to be both very comfortable and extremely challenged for the next four years. Read the rest of this entry »

Be the difference. That’s the challenge that Marquette University in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, has issued to the 1,928 students enrolled as members of its Class of 2014. Aspiring playwright Alex Coddington chose Marquette for many reasons, but that call to action was one of them. Read the rest of this entry »

Choosing a college is often one of a person’s first big adult decisions. For Niall Patten, it is the long term consequences of that decision that carried the most weight. Sure, everyone wants to find a college that is both a comfortable fit and will offer a challenging academic environment, and everyone must find a college they can reasonably afford with some combination of grants, loans, scholarships and parental assistance, but when you are planning to spend another 14 years of your life in school, the long term consequences of your college choice are especially important. Read the rest of this entry »

Munyo Frey-Edwards was a sophomore in high school when her older brother enrolled at Reed College. She got sick that year – really sick – and spent much the year in a hospital in downtown Portland, just a fifteen-minute car ride from Reed’s 116-acre campus on the southeast side of the city. “I wound up spending a lot of time talking with my brother,” she recalls, “and without consciously realizing it, I fell in love with the school. As I began my own college search, I realized Reed had become my base point for evaluating every other school I considered.” Read the rest of this entry »

Commentators often say that the greatest ballerinas do what would be physically impossible for most people so gracefully that it looks effortless. Perhaps her teachers and parents know just how much work it has actually required, but to the untrained eye, Parker Reynolds appears to have handled both her high school years and the college application process so gracefully as to make both appear absolutely effortless. Read the rest of this entry »

Pat Dale puts 120% of what he’s got into every challenge he faces and since arriving at Charles Wright his freshman year, he’s taken on his share of challenges in academics, athletics, arts and leadership. Accepted early decision to Carleton College and given an opportunity to play football for the Knights, just like his older brother, all that effort has just begun to pay off. Dale shows no sign of letting up any time soon. Read the rest of this entry »

Deciding where to go to college might be the only thing about which Natalie Weyerhaeuser has ever changed her mind. That might sound like an exaggeration, but since she arrived at Charles Wright 14 years ago as a bright-eyed Beginning Schooler, Weyerhaeuser has made a name for herself as a particularly focused and driven student. Generally speaking, she knows exactly what she wants and she sticks to it, but when it came to choosing a college, Weyerhaeuser took a different path. Read the rest of this entry »